The Black Banners_ 9_11 and the War Against Al-Qaeda - Ali H. Soufan [125]
At each step of our investigating the Yemen–Bangkok–Malaysia connection, every time we gained an important lead or had new questions, we sent the CIA an official request (through the director of the FBI) asking if they had information. (It is standard procedure for any official request from the FBI to the CIA, or vice versa, to go through the office of the director. This doesn’t mean that the director personally signs off on it or sees it, but it means, rather, that it is an official, high-level request.)
It was in November 2000 that we asked the CIA whether they knew anything about Khallad being in Malaysia or about an al-Qaeda meeting there. The CIA responded (also through the official channels) that they didn’t know anything about al-Qaeda gatherings in Malaysia, and suggested we ask the National Security Agency. The NSA didn’t have the answers for us, either.
In April 2001, after our Legat’s investigations turned up the pay phone number in Kuala Lumpur that we had by then determined had probably been used by Khallad, we sent the CIA a second official request—called, in the FBI, a teletype—asking if they knew anything about the number. This request again went through the office of the director. No response came.
Our third official request was sent in July 2001, when we learned some new details. (Each new request was sent because we had new details or questions, not because we suspected the CIA hadn’t responded truthfully to our previous inquiries.) Again we asked if they knew anything about Khallad and al-Qaeda being in Malaysia or about the phone number. No information was passed along to us.
Notwithstanding our successes in the interrogation room, the security situation in Aden deteriorated, as protests against our presence by Yemeni clerics and parliamentarians multiplied, as did the death threats. Sources told us with increasing frequency that al-Qaeda operatives in the country were plotting to strike at us, including a cell that had traveled to Aden with that purpose. By June 2001 the situation was judged by headquarters to be so dangerous that those of us remaining in the country moved from Aden to Sanaa—viewed as a safer location. The Yemenis agreed to transfer the suspects we needed to interrogate to Sanaa.
We initially stayed at the Sheraton Hotel, but as the threats only continued to increase in number—and as the cell that had moved to Aden to attack us had reportedly followed us to Sanaa—we moved to the U.S. Embassy. Another change we made was to hold our interrogations at night; and we traveled in unmarked cars. We also helped the Yemenis track down the cell threatening us, and in June they arrested eight men whom they accused of plotting to bomb the U.S. Embassy and attack us and Ambassador Bodine.
Staying in the embassy was far from an ideal situation; space and services were limited. We slept on the floor and showered in Marine House, where the marines live within the embassy compound. The cafeteria couldn’t prepare enough food, so we had to order from outside, befriending a Lebanese restaurant owner, who delivered meals every day.
Ambassador Bodine ordered that every member of the FBI and NCIS investigation team pay five to ten dollars a day to the embassy cleaning staff. This came out of our pockets; the FBI doesn’t pick up the tab when agents stay in an embassy or any government facility. FBI and NCIS headquarters were furious that an ambassador would charge agents for sleeping on the floor of an embassy. The cost didn’t bother us; what mattered was that it left us feeling that we weren’t even welcome in our own embassy.
With our long guns locked in the embassy safe by order of Ambassador Bodine, we got around their absence in two different ways. The marines in charge of the safe deliberately left it unlocked in risky situations so we could access the guns if needed. They had again included us in their training, and so needed us to have easy access. Fellow FBI agents like Don Borelli took shifts on